Eurotrip

My Day In St. Emilion Without a Tour Company!

wareontheglobe 5 Comments

As you may know from reading my Wine Cruising to Sauternes post, there are, to many tourists surprise, no vineyards or wine châteaux in the city of Bordeaux! All of the châteaux that make the famous “Bordeaux wine” are located in designated areas around Bordeaux. St. Émilion is one of those areas and in my opinion, is the easiest and best Bordeaux wine region to visit on your own (i.e. without joining a tour) from Bordeaux! 

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St. Emilion vineyards

St. Émilion is world renowned for its full-bodied red wines. But St. Émilion is also an extremely well preserved medieval town that is complete with a unique system underground passageways, wine cellars and even an underground church! As you can imagine, St. Émilion is a very popular day trip from Bordeaux and all of the tour companies offer day trips to St. Émilion from Bordeaux, starting €80,00/person and going up from there.  However, St. Émilion is easily accessible from Bordeaux by train on your own, so that is what we did.  St. Émilion was my favorite day trip out of Bordeaux and a “must do” for anyone in the area!

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Medieval St. Emilion

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A Weekend Retreat in La Rochelle, France

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La Rochelle is a beautiful French seaside town located on the mid-Atlantic coast in the Charente-Maritime province of France, and I just got back from spending a long weekend there!  La Rochelle is known to be popular with French vacationers, particularly Parisians.  However, it is not very well-known in the US, and I probably would never have visited La Rochelle except my college (yay University of Richmond!) had a study abroad program there (I opted for Paris) – and I have a “map of France” t-shirt from Anthropologie that features La Rochelle…  In addition to being featured on an Anthropologie shirt, La Rochelle is quite historical, as it has been around since antiquity, and is the port from which French settlers left for the new world (i.e. Quebec!).

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Club S.E.A., Sala Pergolesi, Malpensa Airport, Milan: Airport Lounge Review

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Malpensa Airpot is a huge airport about an hour outside of Milan.  Malpensa handles a lot of international flights, while Milan’s other airport, Linate, handles domestic and regional flights.  If you are flying into or out of Italy, there is a good change that you will go thorough Malpensa. Here are some pictures of Milan, which as a side note, warrants at least day to see the sites (Milan is home to my favorite duomo)!

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A Cheesy Visit to Gouda, Netherlands!

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Yes, I know the title is ridiculous.  I just couldn’t resist.

Gouda (pronounced “how-da”), Netherlands is a small, canal town in South Holland, a little less than an hour’s train ride from Amsterdam.  Gouda is most famous for its namesake cheese and its famous Thursday market celebrating said cheese – the Kaasstad!  In addition, Gouda has a well-preserved 15th century town hall (the Stadhuys), beautiful canals running throughout the city and a compact center.  I visited Gouda as a day trip from Amsterdam and highly recommend it!  Here are some pictures of the charming town:

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Amsterdam’s Museum District!

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Amsterdam has a number of excellent, world-class museums, on par with those of London, Paris and New York, and I recommend a visit to at least one of these museums on any visit to Amsterdam!  I went to two – the Rijksmuseum and the Van Gogh museum. Both were great ways to spend a few hours!  Most of Amsterdam’s museums are located in the Museum District, about a 30 minute walk from Dam Square. The Museum District includes the Museumplein, Rijksmuseum, Van Gogh Museum, Stedelijk Museum (modern art), Concertgebouw (concert hall), House of Bols (cocktail and genever experience), Diamond Museum and a convenient Albert Heijn under the Stedelijk museum – a good place to find a snack or bottle of wine for the park.

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